Why can't a Brit get a job at Pret?

In the kitchen of Pret A Manger's Fetter Lane shop, numeracy is as valued a skill as carving or spreading. A morning's shift making sandwiches involves several calculations of the time tuna paste can stay in the fridge after it has been opened, precisely how many grams of cheese should be sprinkled into each baguette and how many minutes a given batch of products should take to prepare before the staff-member concerned is judged to be dragging their feet.

As we work away, the kitchen supervisor scribbles timings and comments on her clipboard and on the wall a performance chart lists how well every staff member has done out of 100 during every day they have worked. A couple of new members are rated in the seventies but the shop's manager, Izabella Brzeska - a smiley, blonde 28-year-old from Poland - says they "still have work to do."

The remarkable thoroughness of the place might make for a forbidding environment if the Pret kitchen didn't also have the atmosphere of a communal room in a gap year youth hostel. Amid the frenzied laying on of Wiltshire-cured ham, the kitchen resounds to euro pop tracks and loudly delivered in-jokes between my new colleagues. When Izabella says the main criterion for her staff is passion, she isn't making it up. There is an energy and cheerfulness in the shop that all the workers join in on, and it's something the company trades off very successfully. Chief executive Clive Schlee has said that the enthusiasm of his staff represents "Pret's ultimate competitive advantage".

I'm able to experience their jollity because I'm on a Pret "graduation day", a distinctive recruitment ordeal that may go some way to explaining the other notable thing about their staff: that there aren't many Brits among them. In fact, in this shop there are eight nationalities represented, including recruits from Poland, Italy, Sweden and Nepal, but only one of them was born in Britain.

It's an issue that has put Pret in the political firing line of late. Last week Boris Johnson expressed his disappointment at the dearth of young Londoners manning Pret's tills. "If you've been to one recently," said Johnson, "how many native Londoners served you? What's going on?" The scrutiny of the company's recruitment practices began in November last year, when staff at two central London shops were quoted as saying that they had no British colleagues and employment minister Chris Grayling said it was "unacceptable" for Pret and other chains to hire foreign workers at a time when domestic youth unemployment was rising. Figures released by the Office for National Statistics at the time indicated that more than one million people aged 16 to 24 were out of work, the highest figure on record.

So why do so few young Brits work at Pret? We tracked four Londoners, all British-born, as they applied for jobs at the sandwich chain. All of them fell at Pret's first hurdle, the online application form.

George Gayle, 21, from Enfield was rejected in late November, and Cloe Ansari, 19, from Elephant and Castle, got the same response a month later. George told the Standard he had been through the form carefully with his girlfriend "so I don't see where I went wrong" and Cloe said the handful of questions asked by Pret on the form were not enough for them to judge her abilities. Pret hasn't told either of them why they were immediately turned down, despite both specifically asking for feedback.

Danny Fielding, 18, from Wood Green, a student at London Metropolitan university who wanted one of the part-time roles that Pret offers, says his rejection was too immediate to have received proper attention. He thinks he might have fallen foul of the perception that workers from abroad are a better bet, and will stick with the job longer "because they are more willing to work for lower pay than English people". Pret pays £6.40 an hour, just 32p over the national minimum wage and £1.90 short of the London "Living Wage" - the salary that the London Citizens group campaigns for.

The chain would not be drawn on what percentage of the 45,000 applications they received last year were from British applicants, and in the Fetter Lane store Izabella suggests that the staffing imbalance might result from a shortage of home-born applicants: "Maybe more British people should come to the recruitment centre."

Kieran LeBlanc, 19, from Aldgate, applied for an entry-level job in early December but found out a few weeks later that he hadn't been successful. When he asked why, an email informed Kieran that his request for weekend work "was unsuitable for our business needs", despite the fact that the company has told the Standard that "the majority of our jobs are part-time, so we really suit part-time workers."

When the Standard asked Pret if foreign workers were at an advantage because they offer more time, its human resources director admitted that candidates who are less flexible have less chance of getting picked. The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) points out that the "work ethos" of foreign versus native staff might also play an important role.

"The businesses we work with are only interested in getting the best staff. They need people who have got that drive, determination to succeed, punctuality and good presentation. If that is someone from further afield, that doesn't matter to them," says the FSB's senior development manager, Matthew Jaffa. "A lot of our members do say that there is a work ethos advantage with foreign staff, but there are no figures to bear that out. They say that those from abroad have more willingness to work from the bottom and show dedication."

A factor that has not been flagged up in the debate over Pret's controversial recruitment is its distinctive "graduation day" - the hiring ritual that stands between Pret hopefuls and a job at the company.

Any applicant who does get through the online form, a telephone interview and a meeting with the bosses at Pret's recruitment centre faces the prospect of being judged by arguably the most demanding group of all: the existing staff.

The graduation day involves coming into the shop at six in the morning, working as a normal staff member until lunchtime and then awaiting their judgment. A handful of the team members with whom the applicant came into contact during the morning rate the triallist on the company's three key "behaviours" - "passion", "clear talking" and "team working". The manager then tots up the scores and adds their own feedback before making a decision about their suitability to work at Pret.

At the end of my graduation day, I was judged to be "very polite" and "very calm", but one of the staff remarked to Izabella that I "could show more energy and spark". My form also included the note "jeans not to standard" - apparently they were too light. I don't know if she would have "offered" me the job had I not been a visiting journalist but it is worth considering whether a system where a group of overwhelmingly foreign staff get to vote on every new colleague risks making life more difficult for British applicants. Izabella denies that Eastern European staff show favour to fellow Slavs on graduation days but there is a challenge for Pret to ensure that its apparently democratic hiring procedure doesn't favour the groups that already predominate in their shops.

So is a highly profitable London business - which generated a £46.1million profit (before exceptions) last year - denying local kids work opportunities? And if not, why are so few Brits making the grade at a chain which opened 15 new stores last year in London alone, bringing the total in the capital to 167?

Pret says it "values the cosmopolitan feel" that its international blend affords them but denies the accusation implicit in the media phrase "Pret A Manger phenomenon" - that the chain is denying British applicants a fair crack of the whip. The company's human resources director, Andrea Wareham, tells the Standard that jobs "are open to everyone legally able to work in the UK, no matter what their background". She says that 19 per cent of its staff are British, including 56 per cent in York and 74 per cent in Glasgow, and adds that "London is a very multicultural city" but refuses to give the Standard a figure for the British workers it employs in the capital. "We would like to receive more British applicants than we currently do," she says.

Whether the graduation day system damages the chances of young Brits applying to Pret, or whether it has more to do with foreign applicants offering greater flexibility and a willingness to work for low wages, is difficult to quantify when the firm stoutly resists requests for an explanation. But what is clear is that London's thousands of unemployed young people have their work cut out if they want a job at this very cosmopolitan sandwich shop.

The Pret A rejects

The Standard tracked four young Brits living in London as they tried to get a job at Pret. All four were rejected without an interview.

Kieran LeBlanc, 19, Aldgate Student at London Metropolitan University and looking for part-time work in a cafe or bar.

George Gayle, 21, Enfield Previously worked for Sainsbury's and didn't go to university. Helps out with his dad's street food business.

Cloe Ansari, 19, Elephant and Castle Has previously worked at Oxfam and McDonald's.

Danny Fielding, 18, Wood Green Has previously worked in the kitchen of a Chinese takeaway. Computer science student at London Metropolitan University.

The ten traits Pret looks for in a recruit

1. Be honest Part-time jobs suit us, as we need people for the morning coffee rush - but be honest about your availability.

2. Be flexible The fewer times you say you can't work, the more positions we will have for you.

3. Show commitment We invest a lot in staff training, so we don't want people who say, "I really want to be an architect".

4. Do some research Read up on the company. It is unbelievable how many apply and don't know what we do.

5. Arrive early We would notice if someone was late to an interview. Turn up five minutes early.

6. Dress personal We don't expect people to turn up in a suit - we like individuality - but they should be neat and presentable.

7. Keep smiling Warmth and friendliness is more important than past experience. A lot of the job is engaging with people.

8. Prepare your spiel Good applicants should prepare examples of how they have previously shown our key working principles.

9. Muck in We get a lot of people who say "I'm not really a foodie, I just want to work on the till" - that isn't going to work for us.

10. Bin the CV We don't mind if someone hasn't worked in our industry before. We train people how to make great food and offer top service.